The Fool
by obsidians
Summary: What Dr. Tofu thinks while watching Kasumi on a beach, one shot


I don't own Ranma and make no money for writing these stories.

Sid

I'm a fool as I conceal myself behind a bush so that I might watch my love enjoy a day at the beach.

Perhaps I may seem a stalker to some, but I mean her no harm.

I watch her as she kneels beside her father on the beach attending to his every wish. Her body is that of a young woman in the bloom of youth, all lush but taut curves.

Her bikini is drawing many an admiring glance from young men as they pass by the brown haired beauty, yet she seems not to realize the impact of her own good looks now that her proud figure has been liberated from its normally matronly clothing. Now she looks exactly how she was meant to be, a beautiful teenaged girl enjoying her youth, bereft of the kitchen and family home that keep her enslaved to people, who although love her, seem to take her for granted. She smiles her demure smile at something her father says and glances around, just missing me as I'm quite far from them, yet near enough to see the gentle highlights play in her fawn brown hair.

Kasumi, she was just a child when I met her after moving to Nerima. I assure you it was only after she started to mature that I really noticed her...and fell in love with the woman she was becoming. I watched so many events of her life unfold from afar: her mother dying and felt sad for her, her sacrificing her education by quitting school to take care of her despondent father and family and this made me sadder still, her giving up her school uniform to don her new domestic clothes and become the demure figure she is now. This made me feel sort of mad for some reason.

I watch her laugh at something that Ranma says and envy him at how easily he trades banter with my love. Ranma who uses anger and conceit to conceal his emotions towards a girl he loves just as much as my tomfoolery does! Yet he can speak with Kasumi so I'm jealous of him.

Not that I fault those nearest and dearest to her, I see how they care about her and rely on her kindness and constant cheerful demeanor, in a sense she's the glue that keeps them together. In fact I like most members of her household and as an old family friend, know that they would welcome me to join them for lunch, but I cannot. I would become a babbling fool to be so near to my love and only make her laugh at my antics while the rest look on with sympathy. Why can't I control my idiocy when she's around? I'm a well respected doctor who's popular with my patients and well versed in most subjects under the sun due to my love of reading and exploring different cultures. I'm thought to be witty and have been told I'm easy on the eyes, yet get me around a certain large-eyed slip of a girl and my tongue takes on a life of its own and I succumb to heights of buffoonery that causes me to bow my head in shame when she's gone.

How can I ask her on a date, when I can't even talk to her? How can I ask for her hand in marriage when babbling like a fool and causing her to giggle? When she's around, I'm a danger to my patient and perhaps even to myself!

I watch her collect the empty plates from the lunch she'd just served. My mouth waters at the memory of her delicious cooking that she's brought to my clinic (but never my lonely house) in the past and I try to imagine tasting it every night at my dinner table. Imagine being able to talk to her and tell her about my day, to share a laugh rather then hers being elicited from my own follies. To be able to share a life and bed with her as my wife; I blush at this idea a bit, my thoughts turning temporarily hentai.

She'd make the perfect wife for a busy doctor and perhaps she could even go back to school to become a nurse to assist me in my practice! After all, I make quite good money and have a modest inheritance my father left me, we could easily get a maid to cook and clean for us. I could offer her so many opportunities if only I could just speak with her! It's sad that most of my fantasies about her include just being able to compliment her on her appearance, share a smile and press the tender skin of her hand without gyrating about like a fool with my fogged up glasses.

She takes off her apron after storing away the rest of the picnic and joins her sisters on their blankets.

Suddenly she's just a beautiful girl wearing a flowered bikini and sunglasses, lying under a huge red umbrella with her equally attractive sisters. She's nobody's dutiful daughter or surrogate mother. She's just a pretty teenaged girl for all to admire and dream of asking for tea or for an ice cream date.

She smiles dreamily into the hot sun and I wonder what she's thinking about to cause this...and hope that it's me. Yes Kasumi dream of me the way I do you!

A small boy delivers to her the perfect red rose I asked him to and he shrugs when she asks who it's from. A secret admirer, he'll tell her. Was that a wistful expression on her face as she smelt it...and then passed it off to Akane, saying it must be for her more popular sister, that he made a mistake. Kasumi if you only knew, I would love to surround you with roses for the rest of your life!

Yes all I can do is watch her from afar as the sun plays over her fair features and dream that someday she will see past my helpless shenanigans...and into my heart. That her amused expression will melt into tenderness, because on that day, I will be able to tell her that I love her.

Until that day I shall just have to love her from afar, poor fool that I am.


End file.
